Chapter 5: Dead to Rights, Live for a Leftherian
An act of mercy, Jin called it?
It's a damn shame, that's what it is.
The body of the kitty girl laid limp. Cold and unmoving after Jin extracted his weapon. Something like shock, disbelief or despair was plastered across the face of who she rested on. The kid seemed to still be processing the events. He took a hand off the red aegis weapon and reached over her back. A squelching noise turned his hand red and his eyes wider.
The ambient ether echoed a certain way as the fatal blow was struck. That settled a few uncertainties about the girl. First, that she was a flesh eater. The death of a flesh eater was the only thing that made the ether flow reverberate like that. Second, she was almost certainly That flesh eater, the one they've been trying to recruit for half a decade. Third, she probably wouldn't be joining their merry band of perfectly rational people that also happen to be murderers.
Damn shame, as mentioned.
Is this what they call irony? Chase after any whisper they catch of a Gormotti girl curing the incurable, missing her every time, only to stumble onto her after they gave up, and then having to kill her for the good of the mission they wanted her help with.
Yeah, that sounded pretty ironic.
They had booked it hard back down through the ship once they came to that timely realization, but Malos at least wasn't fast enough.
They felt the ether ripple that they dreaded feeling the entire time they came up with this plan, and Jin plowed through the remaining distance in the blink of an eye. Lucky for Jin, the kid had disarmed the security. Hell knew how, but it didn't matter. The doors were reduced to shreds and the perfect stab was made through the two kids.
Damn shame for them, but that's what they get for not keeping their hands to themselves.
Not like they were going to survive the night anyway.
On the bright side, Mik wouldn't have to break any bad news to anyone.
"…why…?"
Didn't he just ask that?
Granted, it was a marvel the brat was still talking at all. Actually, would Jin have even punctured a lung? The heart is slightly to the right of the chest, so to stab that and go right through, what else would you hit? Malos decided it didn't really matter.
"Why go through all this trouble?" the kid managed to choke out.
Oh, so that's what he's asking about. He was dying anyways, was there much harm in humoring him?
Malos could tell him.
Or he could be rude.
Tough choice.
"Our reasons for uncovering the Aegis are above your pay grade, brat. Now that we found her, nobody else can be allowed to know that we have her." Malos told him, rudely.
Noting the shocked expression, Malos chuckled and continued.
"Look on the bright side. Even if you and your friend didn't touch her, we still would've killed you by the time we made it back topside."
The Aegis' blade was dropped from the boy's hands as horror crept up through his expression.
"You…you won't get away…with this…"
"Oh, we already have. Everybody on this mission will die tragically as any evidence is lost in a dangerous and uncharted section of the clouds. Nobody will ever know what we were doing out here, nobody will ever even know we survived."
The boy began trying to pull himself back, a pathetic display as he struggled to move with the literal deadweight on top of him. The attempt stopped as the kid fell off the raised platform, flat on to his back.
Jin effortlessly flicked the blood off his blade with a twitch of the wrist, before returning it to its holster on his back.
Malos almost started walking to take their prize, but he flinched as a yell erupted from the floor.
Loud didn't begin to describe it, but it luckily stopped nearly as suddenly as it started. The little shit was not only somehow still alive, but mostly fully capable of movement. He pulled himself off the ground as he tried rupturing the ear drums of the others present, and pulled the piece of steel garbage from behind his back to attack Jin.
Unsurprisingly, Jin had already regained composure, redrawn his sword, and succeeded in knocking the weapon out of the brat's hands with a slash across his chest.
More accurately, it was several slashes, but Malos couldn't see most of them. As he stumbled backwards once again, the front of the kid's shirt was reduced to ribbons and Malos got a clear view of the problem.
"Another flesh eater, eh? That explains a few things."
Kid's wounds were already beginning to regenerate, despite the impressive crack in his core Jin's initial stab had left. What seemed to be gills on his chest opened for a large gulp of air, and two incredibly ordinary-looking knuckle claws appeared on his hands in a flash of light.
Through clenched teeth and a lot of panting, the boy managed to yell something. "You…bloody psychopaths!" he cried, apparently unable to repeat whatever he did while on the floor.
The boy charged at Jin, which went as comically poor as Malos ever could have hoped. It looked as if he tripped, his guttural battle cry cutting short as he almost appeared to fall through Jin. New slashes were traced across his body as he began tumbling towards Malos.
Without missing a beat, Malos drove his boot into the little bastard's stomach. The kick threw both the kid and a satisfying crunch into the air, the former flying hard into the far wall. Both participants of the collision groaned from the shock, and the kid's agonized grunts as he curled up on the floor made it clear that somehow he still wasn't dead.
Not that Malos wasn't having fun, but this was getting a little stale.
"If you're that desperate to stay alive, just stay down there while we do our business. You can do whatever you want once we leave." Malos told him as he finally began approaching the final piece of their plan. She seemed to have made one last shopping trip before disappearing from the world, but there was no mistaking the core of Mythra.
It would be so easy, if he wanted to (and he most certainly did want to) he could just grab the assembly and rip her resting place right out of the wall. Hell, looks like that litteral bastard of a hero even had the courtesy to prepackage their order with a coffin.
One might imagine how aggravated Malos became when he caught a glimpse of movement in his peripheral vision.
The kid was, somehow, back on his feet. No, not quite. He was bloody, hunched over, and clearly supporting his weight on just one foot. If his teeth were clenched any harder, the kid would probably crack a molar. Still, he was standing, again.
"You know, kid, you're really starting to-"
Malos paused, his eyes widening at what the little shit was holding.
For what it was worth, the brat seemed to have good taste in last ditch efforts. Malos would be lying if he said he didn't defensively jump back when he saw the weapon of the aegis pointed at him for the first time in centuries.
He sighed quietly as he remembered a relaxing fact. The person holding it had held it before, and he was presumably more alive at the time.
As nothing continued to happen from the boy, Malos smiled as his head shook in disappointment.
"Nice bluff, you nearly had me going."
The kid was practically snarling. "Don't…don't you start. I saw…I saw you flinch! You said you had to kill us because we touched it! You're scared of this!"
He raised the weapon and took up a better stance for it, and the sight made Malos chuckle. The thing was in as deep a sleep as its blade, neither were likely to wake anytime soon. The kid may have been half right, but unfortunately he was the other half.
"Scared? Well, maybe a little, but only if it's actually held by someone-" his smile grew wicked as he clenched his tonfa. The edge flashed into existence, and Malos was careful to stress this last part: "-competent!"
The two weapons clashed, the still dormant Aegis sword was pushed back under Malos' assault. The kid was in no shape to keep fighting, his exhaustion was obvious through his sloppy movements and his self-healing was only getting slower. Blow after blow slipped past the boy's defenses, his voice becoming more frustrated which was only making his pitiful counter attacks even sloppier.
His side was punched as he tried for an overhead swing, his attempt at a side slash was parried and countered by an uppercut. As Malos' arm was still in the air, a simple flick of the wrist brough the edge of his weapon facing out. A monstrous yell preceded a devastating blow to the kid's head.
The brat began stumbling backwards for what Malos hoped was the last time, but there was no such luck. The kid somehow managed to catch himself. His eyes wavering, his stance uneven and off balance, an empty gaze slowly rising to meet his opponent's as crimson began staining his hair. The only sign of remaining defiance was the fact that he was still pointing the blade with both hands.
Then he began glowing.
A brilliant, golden colour began seeping out of him, and, against all odds, the weapon he held was beginning to respond.
The aegis sword began shaking, sparks flew off it as if some gears inside it were spinning full speed against each other in opposite directions. It was trying to grow to full size, but the components weren't synchronized. Different pieces moved in and out of their active position at random, often blocking other pieces trying to do the same. The weapon sputtered and coughed as what was meant to be a blade edge made from ether was substituted with smoke and embers.
"Damn brat, what the hell are you doing?!" Malos shouted at the sight.
The boy himself didn't answer, not with words anyway. He stammered and grunted as his body began to tremble alongside the weapon.
Malos didn't quite understand what he was looking at, but he took a wild guess as blood began dripping out the boy's nose.
This can't be happening.
"Drop that thing, or you'll regret it!"
The sparks flying off the sword began turning a bright green, and it slowly began sliding into its proper active form.
No, this can't be happening!
The aegis herself began stirring, the crystalline decorations of her outfit glowed green to match the sparks of her weapon. Her eyelids fluttered, never staying completely open, her eyes glazed over.
This was the one thing he couldn't have let happen, and it was happening before his eyes.
The kid was trying to resonate with her. He was failing, but that didn't matter.
It was odd for a flesh eater to not have driver potential, but even just this attempt might be enough to shake the aegis from her slumber. He gripped the sword tonfa and yelled a signal to Sever. He would need all the might available to him if he wanted to face Mythra as he was. Jin was strong, but they've never had a proper benchmark to compare the limits of his power. With knowledge that their only chance of winning might rest on how tired she is, Malos turned to face his old partner.
The aegis inhaled deeply, taking what must have been her first breath of air since she was sealed down here.
Then her sword exploded.
Red shrapnel flew through the air, Sever had placed himself between the blast and Malos just in time to project an ether shield. The fragments collided violently against anything within their line of sight, though any noise they made were drowned out.
An ear-splitting shriek was all that could be heard. Malos could hear the strain it put on the kid's voice once it passed the fifteen second mark. The rivets in the wall began rattling as the aegis started to convulse in her casket. Her seizure coincided with a large burst of blue, glowing blood from the wound in the kid's head. Malos wasn't sure he could explain what he was watching, but whatever the hell it was, it was far from finished. A certain odor filling the room told him that. It was a revolting stench, one Malos was quite familiar with.
The smell of burning flesh.
Black smoke began to leak out of the boy's gills and mouth. The lack of oxygen replaced his screams with a rumbling choke as he began failing to breathe. Unfortunately for him, his efforts to get the fumes out bore no fruit. His lungs were the source of the smoke, and what smoke foretells wouldn't take much longer.
The aegis once again became limp, and as if on cue a torrent of fire spewed out of the kid's open mouth. Following soon, more flames erupted from the slots in his chest, as well as from his back and just behind his hands. He was thrown around the room as the blazing streams pushed him every which way, slamming into and occasionally dragging himself across a wall. How strong any of the jets were at any moment had no rhythm or reason, yet they all burned hot enough to leave any section of floor, wall or ceiling they traced over a bubbling red, occasionally burning right through.
If the kid was still screaming, Malos couldn't tell. The roar of the inferno made it difficult to hear even his own thoughts.
Even when the flames eventually died down, thin columns of smoke were left billowing out from his chest.
Through some miracle, the chaotic acrobatics he was forced into ended with him on his feet. A miracle still, he was standing. His shoulders sagged, and his head hung low, his back hunched, but his legs didn't move at all.
Fresh burns covered the kid's body, Malos didn't want to imagine what his insides looked like. Even just breathing must have been agony for him.
As the cinders that were once his suit blinked into dust, he raised his head in one final act of defiance and stared listlessly towards Malos. The look on his face was blank, his eyes were completely lifeless. Whether from the smoke stinging his eyes or simply from the pain, the kid tried to cry and was met with little success. Any tears that found their way out of his eyes spattered and hissed into steam, as if his skin was a hot fry pan.
A shrill cracking noise suggested the chip in his core grew to a complete fracture, and as a result his body twitched and warped.
The kid fell to his knees, finally knocking on death's door. Pieces of the sword he held only moments ago dug into his legs. His form continued to flicker, as if he was a screen with a magnet held to it.
After a short eternity, his torso fell forward. His chest never touched the floor.
The body turned into a puff of light and mist, disintegrating as it fell through the air.
Two halves of the most misshapen core crystal Malos had ever seen split apart when they hit the ground. One half rolled a full rotation before stopping.
The other was held in place by the arm it was attached to.
Somehow, the boy's right arm all the way up to the shoulder remained. The respective half of the core was connected to said shoulder.
Malos was of course no stranger to gruesome sights, but while it probably wasn't the worst fate he had caused…
Whatever that was is probably up there with the worst fates he'd ever witnessed.
With nothing else to really do about it, Malos started laughing.
It was odd. Malos never laughed much. He could find things funny, he chuckled at most occasions of Mikhail's romance woes, but he didn't laugh at many things.
Nothing was ever worth laughing at. He didn't know why he couldn't hold himself back here. He didn't even have any snarky comments about…
…disarming?
No, that was awful.
Point proven, Malos wasn't sure what he was supposed to feel.
Sever tried forcing himself to join in, but he quickly lost heart.
Malos needed to repeat that to himself.
Sever …lost heart in laughing at someone's pain.
Hysterical. Truly, the world must be ending.
Malos wasn't sure what he was even laughing at. The spectacle wasn't particularly funny, really. Laughing was just easier than thinking about what he just watched, and what it actually meant.
Of all the ways to go…
That kid was pretty resilient. Jin couldn't even put him down. All that work standing for himself, only to end up being taken out by Mythra. A child politely calls upon the sacred power of the holy aegis, and he burns to death for his troubles. Was that ironic?
That's what was so funny to him, Malos decided, the irony of it. Such a ghastly death caused by the one who stood against him; the one who was supposed to be so good and righteous had murdered someone in cold blood without even looking at them.
"Cold blood" being purely metaphorical, in this case.
The kid showed some promise, too. A flesh eater that could take that much punishment was nothing to sneeze at. Maybe if they had known he was a flesh eater to begin with…
Oh well.
He's dead now.
It was a damn shame.
And it was freaking hilarious.
Even the stoic, unflinching Jin was affected. His ice-cold demeanor let a slight hesitation escape before he approached.
"…what just happened?" his voice was an emotional void, as always.
Truthfully, Malos didn't know.
Truthfully, Malos still wasn't sure he wanted to know.
The kid's core was clearly irreparable, so Malos didn't think it mattered.
Malos walked up to the altar that held the aegis, kicked the arm out of his sight, and wasted no time in beginning to pull the tube free.
After what just occurred, the obnoxious screech of metal tearing was relatively calm.
Malos propped the container on his shoulder before turning around to face the only other person remaining.
"Call the Monoceros." He told Jin.
After doing so, Jin began for the door. Conspicuously, the completely intact core of that beast blade had been safely set down on the aegis' old pedestal. Jin made no mention of it, so Malos made no effort to collect it. An act of mercy, as Jin would say. The ones who fell here probably deserved to rest somewhat peacefully. Malos didn't need to do anything else after what just happened.
The melted floor stopped hissing, and the cloud sea began leaking in through the holes left by the fire. They returned up the path they came, Malos' extreme weight increase made his footsteps boom through the corridors. As the pair disappeared down into the halls of the ship, the booms turned to echoes, and the echoes eventually turned to silence.
The Aegis taken, the dim room held nothing more of importance. Empty as the day it was made, and it would never see another occupant. The quiet filled the air, entirely devoid of noise, just as it had been for the last Architect-knows-how-long.
Completely silent, so long as one ignored the sounds of the severed arm twitching in the corner.
Her head felt vacant.
Not quite empty, there was certainly stuff in there. She could feel things. She was feeling plenty at this very moment.
The chime of bells in the distance, the tickle of grass under her, the soothing warmth of the sun, and the sunlight beating against her eyelids.
Her head felt vacant because feeling was all she could do. For a time, her thoughts were an echo chamber, stuck repeating things she had just experienced before processing the next experience.
She eventually figured out she could focus on something. She would have preferred to be able to focus on whatever she liked, but the bells insisted on holding on to her attention for her.
They sounded distant, yet held their presence. A constant promise that they were, in fact, here as well. Not that there was much else sound-wise to focus on. The air held still. No wildlife was audible.
She began thinking more and more about the bells. Taking aspects of it, and deciding if they were good or bad. She formed an opinion.
She decided she thought the bells sounded nice. They weren't anything special as far as music went, but as a sound it was interesting. It was almost haunting how the delicate notes hung in the air.
She had never heard the Praetorium's bells before, but it was definitely a sound that fit their 'holy will of the architect' shite.
…
…the Praetorium…?
Her eyes slammed open as she jolted awake. She practically threw herself off the ground as she frantically looked around.
They surely wouldn't have sent their whole Titan after her, right?
She was way too small a problem for them to bring out any big guns, much less the biggest guns they had, right?
This must just be some incredibly unfortunate coincidence, right?
Dread grew as the bells kept tolling. She could only hope they weren't tolling for her.
What did tolling mean, anyways?
Things took tolls on other things, why were bells the only thing that tolled for something?
She tried letting the pointless questions distract her from the very real fact that she was probably in more danger than she had ever been.
It wasn't working
She couldn't see them, but her ears couldn't lie.
The bells came from towards the lone tree on a cliff on the edge of the clearing.
She couldn't see them, still.
The sky was perfectly open past the hill before the cliff, and even though Indol was a smaller country, it was still a country. She could hear the gentle crash of the waves below the cliffside, there was no way in hell a whole Titan was hiding below the drop. Even so, if she was this close to hear the bells so clearly, she could've heard anything else from the Titan.
She heard nothing else. No city noises, no Titan calls, no wings flapping, nothing.
There was no possible way the bells could have been from the praetorium.
…Just to be safe, she began running in the opposite direction.
There was a tree line in that direction. She could hide there until the bells stopped.
The distance closed. She didn't think she had ever been so happy to see trees in her whole life.
Her smile was wiped clean off as she ran face first into something.
She ran into it full speed, and the hit brought her full stop. It was the type of impact that made your nose feel flat.
She didn't see what it was. She reflexively closed her eyes during impact.
She rubbed her nose to ease the pain, and peaked out to see what she hit.
Nothing.
There was nothing in front of her.
She was still a good twenty peds from the trees. Between her and them was nothing but an open field.
She resumed walking forward, slightly more cautiously this time.
Sure enough, she bumped into something again.
Nothing.
She was bumping into nothing.
She reached out and felt the nothing's surface.
It was a wall. A solid wall made of nothing. She couldn't feel anything about it, it had no texture, it barely even had a surface. All she felt was that her hands should be pressed against something. The only noise it made when she knocked on it was the sound her hand made when hit against anything.
It was a wall that wasn't there.
For the life of her, she couldn't figure out what to do about it, if there was indeed anything to be done.
"Damn it." She said out loud.
"I can't get through," she seemed to say to someone, "What do you think, Dro-"
She turned to face nobody. She was puzzled. There was usually someone with her.
She thought about what it meant, wondering if she said something she shouldn't have.
Her eyes widened as everything came rushing back to her.
The mission.
The exploration.
The door.
The girl.
The hole in her mind before her thoughts started spewing nonsense.
Nia doubled over as all the pictures arranged themselves nice and neatly. The whole event played like a photo album.
The image of a black core crystal stopped the slideshow, along with the pretty little "ting" noises it made as it hit the ground. For some reason, it made her sick to her stomach.
She began focusing on that image. A blurry, white shape began to form in her mind.
No, not blurry, it was just a little fuzzy.
White and fuzzy, just like Dromarch.
Dromarch…
Dear, sweet Architect, Dromarch!
Nia collapsed onto all threes, her free hand covering her mouth as she heaved and retched through sobs.
She did everything with him. She had known him since forever, and he had been her blade for nearly ten years.
All that time. All those memories. The laughs, the cries, every meal, every hug, everything.
Gone.
All gone in an instant.
All of it, gone forever, just because she was…
…Because…because she…she was…
Bleu~gh!
Her throat burning, her eyes stinging, her nose running, Nia didn't care. She tried letting the discomfort soak into her, a futile effort to stop trembling in horror as she remembered what happened.
It was instantaneous, but that didn't make it any less disturbing. A slight poke, like a needle in her back, and she lost feeling in her everything. Her memories had disappeared within a single moment, so completely that she didn't remember who or where she was. Then, everything just went dark. A voice in her head she didn't recognize started yelling at her that something was wrong. Words she didn't understand, and then…well, and then nothing.
Jin had spoken a big game about helping people like her find a place in the world.
Apparently, that place was stuck on the business end of a katana.
…which she no longer was on.
It went needle, nonsense, nothing, then…
Then what?
What came after nothing? What could come after nothing?
She rolled over, careful to roll away from the wall and off of the mess she just made.
The sky was bright, brighter than it normally was.
The lack of clouds made it too bright to look at for too long.
"Where the hell am I?"
She turned her focus to what she was laying on, plucking a handful of grass from the ground. She sputtered as some fell into her face, prompting her to sit up.
There was something off about it, she wasn't sure she knew what. Nia was far from a master of botany, but after so many years on the run she had seen a lot of places and a lot of grass. This wasn't one of them. Of course, Dromarch was far more knowledgeable on general plants than her.
She tried focusing on something else to stop the sudden heaviness in her stomach.
Trees, that was a good place to look.
The trees were not really nearby at all. The invisible wall made sure of it.
She was too far to make out anything about them, and there were no leaves anywhere on the ground.
For a time that was true, at least.
In a moment, without any provocation, the wind began to rage. It happened faster than should be possible, there was no acceleration, no lead into it, just a wall of air running itself right into Nia's face along with the leaves she had been looking at. The sky remained clear as ever but that didn't stop lighting from arcing across it. In spite of the thunder and howling gales, the bells ran crisper than ever.
Nia winced as dust was kicked into her eyes. She flattened her ears to her head, mostly to protect them from all the noises but a small part of her worried the wind might take them. Not that she ever actually believed the old gormotti bedtime stories about storms stealing the ears of naughty children, but better safe than sorry.
A single lightning bolt made its way to the ground, all the way over at the lone tree by the cliff, and as suddenly as it started, the storm disappeared. The air became still once more, and the bells continued to stay the same.
Nia didn't know what to think about it, if she even should think about it, but if nothing else she was now surrounded by fallen leaves.
She investigated one of the more intact ones.
It was green, which, in her experience, was generally a good colour for leaves to be. It certainly looked like a leaf. Also a good sign. It was round and pointy all at once, a serrated teardrop shape.
It was completely alien. In all her days, Nia had never seen a leaf like it. Some similar one's, sure, but it wasn't quite right. It didn't fit any species of tree she was familiar with.
She was familiar with quite a few, so that should have been close to impossible.
"Where the hell am I?" She reiterated.
The obvious answer was that she was at the bottom of a hill by a cliff on the shore of a lake, next to a wall that didn't exist and a puddle of disgusting that she probably shouldn't let anyone know was her's. That unfortunately didn't answer anything. Alrest had plenty of hills, and statistically speaking several of them probably had trees and cliffs by them. She'd even argue the addition of the puddle did not narrow it down. There was nobody else around to ask, either. Nobody to ask basic directions from, nobody who tried to make conversation leading Nia to lie or dodge questions, not even a large cat with a calming voice to get advice from or snuggle up against. For the first time in ten years, Nia was truly alone.
The bells reminded her that they had in fact not gone anywhere, which snapped her out of thinking about who had left.
Nia turned her attention back to the wall, wherever it was. Once her hands rediscovered it, Nia tapped against it once more.
Still solid, and yet leaves from the other side made it in. Maybe that meant there was a hole in it somewhere?
She ran her hands along it. Finding no way to breach it, she followed it along the end of the clearing.
Said end happened to meet the cliff. The wall continued off the cliff as far as Nia dared to reach over the edge. Contrary to popular belief, gormotti only landed on their feet about as frequently as any other race.
Part of her was tempted to try the other direction, but if she just looped around the cliff, she'd probably find that section anyway. Her walk-along buddy was exchanged from the invisible wall to the cliff. Even if those bells were the praetorium's, if she couldn't see them then they couldn't see her.
She made it a record five feet before she had to retire that belief.
She dropped to the ground, lying prone as flat as she could. The grass wasn't very high, and her silver hair would have stood out like a sore thumb, but damn it she was trying her best.
The sudden cause for stealth was a very simple one: she could see someone.
Meaning they could see her.
There was a figure by the far point of the cliff, under the lone tree that was impressively still standing after being struck by lightning. Nia couldn't see much of them, but anyone made this more dangerous. She didn't know where she was or anything about the people who lived here, and that was without the possibility of it being someone who actively wanted her dead.
…except she might already be dead…
She hadn't thought about that. She had just come from being stabbed, after all. It was a surprisingly sobering thought, and the first one she had that actually explained things about where she was. Maybe the trees were an extinct species, which is why she didn't recognize them.
Did this where blades went when they can't be resonated with anymore? Surely, there would be more people here if it was though, right?
Maybe it was Hell's proverbial reception desk. Not that Nia thought she belonged in Hell, but all the religious folk seemed to think she did so her opinion on the matter may not hold much value.
Nia had tried to be a good person, that one thing she was forced to do and regretted ever since notwithstanding. She healed people where she could, or more accurately where her healing was allowed. As it turned out, a surprising number of people would rather die from terminal illnesses than be healed by a monster.
Maybe Nia should have pushed harder to heal them anyways. Would healing someone against their will qualify as a good or bad deed?
In any case, she was here, wherever 'here' is, and there was someone over there, wherever that was.
She didn't know who they were or what they wanted, or if they even wanted something in the first place.
Nothing ventured and all that, but what would it matter if she gained anything?
She might actually be dead, so how much worse could it get? There was nowhere else to go anyway.
Just to be safe…
It took her a moment to remember how to do it. When was the last time she summoned her own weapon? She hadn't tried ever since-
Stop thinking about it.
She flexed her hand and tensed her arm. Ether began sloshing out bit by bit. She could swear it used to feel more natural then this, but it gradually did what it was meant to.
A blue, straight-edged sword began materializing in her grip. A vine grew from the crossguard and climbed around the blade, three of Nia's old favourite flowers were forever in bloom along the stem.
The catalyst scimitar. Her own weapon.
…Was the blade always that skinny?
It would have to do. She felt nauseous just thinking about the thing, much less holding it. She wouldn't have even considered using it if she had other options.
She raised her stance a little, from prone to crouching, and began to sneak up on the tree.
It was a bit of a distance, but Nia covered it fairly quickly.
As she approached, she could make out the person more clearly. Whatever they were wearing, two ribbon-like strips fluttered about, despite the lack of a breeze.
As Nia got even closer, more details of this person were distinguishable. The proportions suggested that they were a woman. The ribbons were hanging off her shoulders, a bit like how one might wear a cape. She was standing mostly straight, her back to Nia, leaning on the tree a little with one hand as if she was resting.
The bells in the distance seemed to get louder as Nia began to recognize her.
She wore opaque, salmon-pink stockings, and her hair was a fiery red.
"It's such a mournful sound…" said a soft voice.
Nia hadn't realized she had gotten so close. There was maybe twelve feet between them now, and it was the woman who spoke.
Seemed like a good place to ask some questions. "Who are you and where am I?"
"It hasn't stopped…" she continued, ignoring Nia, "not in all these years."
Alright, cutting straight to the point didn't work. Nia decided she should play along.
"The bells, you mean?" she feigned interest, "I'd imagine that got annoying pretty quick."
The woman said nothing.
"I mean, it puts a real damper on the mood. Like you said, it's not the most cheerful of noises."
The silence would have been deafening if not for those very bells.
Ah, to hell with it -
"My name is Pyra." the woman answered before Nia could even finish her annoyed sigh.
Nia looked up in time to notice that the woman had turned around. Her face looked younger up close. She was smiling. The sort of warm, caring smile that could stop a child from crying.
Nia was neither a child nor was she crying anymore, so while it was a nice gesture it didn't help her situation.
"I mean you no harm, Nia." Pyra began to say.
"And that's exactly what people who've meant me harm have said!" Nia was practically growling, "why do you know my name? Why did anyone on this job know my name? Why does…"
Why does anybody know her name at all? Why the hell did she tell her name to so many damn people in the last few days? She had been so careful, beyond careful for all her life. She never spoke to anyone if she didn't need to, she always kept her head down and always kept moving. Why did it have to end like this? Why was the one time she decided to take a real job…
Why had she taken that damn job in the first place? It was obviously nothing but trouble.
Indol had no reason to still be after her, not after this long. Those two bastards who hired her couldn't have been working for Indol, could they? Could this whole thing really just be a massive, tragic coincidence?
"Nia."
She sniffled a little, and shook herself out of that thought train. She pointed her weapon at 'Pyra'.
"Where the hell am I?" She barely hid a quiver in her voice.
Pyra didn't have an answer right away. The redhead turned back around, facing out towards the horizon. She was looking at something in the distance. There was a town on the opposite shore of the lake.
"This…is Elysium." She continued, "It's where…'we' were born."
Nia felt her brain grind to halt at those words. Different parts began arguing about what they just heard.
You heard her right?
Yeah, but there's no way that's what she said.
Why not?
Because…well because! There's no way.
Look around, Sherlock!
Come on you two, stop fighting.
This could easily be somewhere on Alrest.
Alright, smartass, then where's the World Tree?
Wait, where was the world tree?
Nia never really noticed it in day to day life, it was just something that was always there. She hadn't even realized it was completely absent from the horizon.
There was no documented case of any landmass so far that it would not be able to see the tree at all, so the only real possibility was that she was…
…on top…
"Are you shitting me…" Nia whispered incredulously.
Her weapon dissolved as she dropped it. She ran further up to the cliff's edge.
The lake she was looking across. It was massive. Obscenely massive. Lakes this big had only ever been speculation, no Titan could ever possibly be big or strong enough to carry that much blue water on them in one place.
So, she wasn't on a Titan. She could tell that from something else that she didn't notice was missing.
No part of the ground was moving. There was no sense of motion, no slight rise and fall on the horizon, no squash or stretch in the earth.
Solid, unmoving terrain and clear blue water, as far as the eye could see.
"This is actually Elysium?"
"Yes." Pyra confirmed, "or, at least…my memory of it."
"Even then, you've been to Elysium?! It's real?!" Nia could barely process the information.
If Elysium is real, that means the architect is real, and that means Indol is really following the will of the worlds creator, and that means that Nia is actually-
"Nia!"
Pyra seemed quite skilled in stopping her from spiraling.
"Sorry, you're…dropping a lot on me here." Nia sighed. The back of her head was suddenly very itchy.
Nia properly processed all that was said, and became confused by something Pyra had said.
"You said this was your memories of Elysium? Am I in your head or something?"
"Something like that, yes." Pyra replied.
"How did I get here?"
Pyra turned somber at that question. "Just now, when we came into contact, and you were…"
Nia read the room. "I was really killed then?"
"…yes. Stabbed through the core crystal. If you were a normal blade, you would have died on the spot."
"…but?"
Pyra turned towards Nia once more, the strange 't' symbol on her chest seemed to be glowing. "But, I was able to save you."
"Well…I mean, not to sound ungrateful or anything, but…"
Pyra smiled slightly. "You would have preferred if I saved the rest of you?"
Nia hesitated, considering if she wanted to tell this to the reason she still existed.
"…I think I would have preferred if you didn't save me at all."
Pyra covered her mouth as she gasped. "Nia-"
"Nobody is going to miss me, I only kept kicking because I didn't want to get caught." Nia turned around to sit on the hill, "If everything's over…I think I'd rather the world forgot about me."
Nia looked back at the tree line she had just come from. The bells seemed to quiet down once she resigned to her fate. She closed her eyes, trying to return to the vacant state she had started in.
She could hear Pyra's fist tightening behind her, but Nia didn't care. She was already dead, what was a punch going to do to her?
She had spent most of her life now just running and hiding, hoping to live somewhat normally someday. Looking back on it, there were a lot of things she would have liked to change, but none of that mattered now. The bells were nearly silent. Nia almost felt like she was falling.
"…what about that boy you were with?"
CLANG
Her eyes were forced back open by the question. The bells were even louder than they had been since she arrived.
A face reappeared in her mind. Messy brown hair, rusty orange-brown eyes, blue salvage suit…
A face of abject horror as he realized he had been impaled.
"Oh shit, Rex!" She yelled as she scrambled back to her feet.
That was why she took the job. That was why she had willingly told her name to so many people on the job. That reckless little shit roped her into this, but she hadn't minded. He was so kind to her, even after she told him as much as she dared about herself.
She turned back to Pyra. Her arms were crossed, her soft face was much sterner looking. It was just a trick of the light, but for a moment her hair looked like it was blonde.
Nia didn't know how Pyra knew, Nia didn't know how she had forgotten.
What Nia did know was that she'd never forgive Jin. Malos had been a prick the whole time, but she thought Jin was meant to restrain him.
Rex was the first person in years she would consider calling a friend.
And he was dead. He had died the exact same way she had. Jin killed them both, because they had served their purpose.
…Wouldn't that mean…
"Where is he?" Nia asked.
Pyra looked confused now. "What-"
"Rex, where is he?" Nia demanded.
"I don't-"
"You said that you brought me here because I was holding that red thing when I died!" Nia shouted with a point, "Rex was holding it too! We died in the exact same way! Where is he?"
"Nia, You were the only one who touched my weapon!" Pyra herself paused as she said that. Her eyes narrowed, making her look even more confused. "Wait, no, that's not right, is it?"
"Damn right, it's wrong," Nia said in agreement, "what happened to him?"
Pyra placed a hand on her forehead, "I…I don't know…that shouldn't be possible. I can resonate with anyone, so why couldn't he…"
Nia could see a few wisps of smoke leave Pyra's mouth as she thought. The wind gradually began picking up as the red-head was getting increasingly lost in thought.
This wasn't going anywhere good, that much was clear to Nia.
"Anyway, what about him?"
Snapped out of her slight delirium, Pyra refocused herself and faced Nia. "Not just him. Everyone else on that salvage ship. A whole crew of innocent people. Jin and Malos had no qualms murdering two childeren, what makes you think anyone else on the job is safe?"
Another trick of the light, Nia wasn't sure how red was able to look blonde so easily.
At any rate, while it was a good point, there was a glaring issue.
"I realize how awful that is, but what do you expect me to do about it? First, I'm dead. Second, I'm stuck in your head."
Pyra's face returned to its softer expression.
"A trade, then." She said, moving her hand as if to present her core crystal, "I can give you half of my life force. That way you'll be revived."
Nia's eyes probably bulged out of her skull. It took one hell of a healer blade to take care of fresh fatal wounds, blades that could raise the dead were practically unheard of.
She felt a small piece of her grow smug about needing to use the word 'practically'.
While it was a tempting offer…
"…and in return?"
Pyra's breath trembled a little before she answered. It was so slight, anyone other than Nia probably wouldn't have heard it.
"…I mentioned that this place was only my memories. Will you…take me to Elysium? The real one, atop the world tree?"
Nia felt a shock at the suggestion. On the one hand, of course someone from paradise would want to return. On the other, a bubble of guilt floated up in her memories. Specifics were still hazy, it seemed she was still recovering from being stabbed, but she did remember one thing. A conversation she had recently.
I want to find a way up there.
I want to find Elysium.
Rex had this dream for so long. He had been laughed at so many times for it, he was surprised when Nia didn't.
And he wasn't here. For some reason, Nia was brought here instead. Not even Pyra, the girl that did it, knew how or why.
Survivor's guilt was a strange thing to have when you were already dead, but as she thought on the request, that very subject raised a certain issue with what Nia could do.
"Couldn't you go by yourself? Just, go back up the way you came down?"
Pyra grew somber once more.
"If I could, I'd have done it long ago. I'm sorry to drag you into this, but even the aegis needs a driver."
The…aegis? The name rang a bell, and that wasn't just because of the bells ringing.
Nia really should have payed more attention during Dromarch's history lectures.
"So, Nia, what do you say?"
If Nia had died just a few weeks ago, this wouldn't even be worth considering. Nia had despised what her life became, and only ran because she was too scared of what could have come after.
One boy managed to change that. She wouldn't have believed it if it didn't happen to her. She scratched behind her ear as she felt a small smile grow on her face. He probably would have accepted in a heartbeat. If he couldn't, then she'd do it for him.
Come back to life to avenge that boy and save his coworkers? At the moment, it seemed like a great idea, and unfortunately there wasn't anyone around to complain about her impulsive decision making.
"Ah, what the hell? I've never met a tree I didn't want to climb," (shite, how long has it been since she's said that?) "And besides, not like I have anything better to do. Let's do it."
Pyra smiled once more at Nia's answer. It really was a nice smile. Gave a nice warm, fuzzy feeling.
"Thank you."
"S'fine," Nia replied simply, "Now, uh, how exactly do we…?"
Pyra closed the distance between them, until they were within arms reach of each other.
She was…a bit taller up close.
"Now put your hand on my chest."
Nia nodded firmly.
She reached her hand out, slightly hesitant. It seemed like an odd way to be revived, but, hey, Pyra was the aegis. Whatever that meant.
Slowly, her fingers approached the red-clad girl.
She made contact, and waited.
And waited.
Nothing seemed to be happening.
"…Nia?"
"Hm? Yeah?"
"I meant the core crystal."
"…Oh. That…makes much more sense… ahem . Sorry."
Take two, more hesitation this time, she reached for the green stone that was slightly higher and to the left of her initial target.
She was a little embarrassed that she didn't realize that's what Pyra meant in the first place. She'd be sure to never mention this again.
She touched the green crystal, and it immediately began shining. Light and ether poured out, both a stunning if slightly blinding emerald colour, as if they were being consumed by wildfire. The ether wrapped around the pair, and Nia felt something that she hadn't in…what has it been, twenty years now?
Even after all that time, she recognized it. She had forgotten how amazing it was.
She was probably the first blade to ever feel it twice in a lifetime.
The feeling of resonance.
The feeling of coming to life.
A lie was told earlier, when it was said this room would stay silent.
The room itself was below cloud sea level. Though there were holes, none of them led to open air. Cloud sea leaked in through some of them, but that was all.
In spite of this, there was a breeze. A light one at first, nothing more than draft. Then it picked up. The air spun faster and faster, a veritable whirlwind picking up. There was no source, the air simply moved. Tiny black shards strewn about on the ground were picked up with the air, and a green light shone through the center of it all.
The fragments on the wind began glowing too, and the wind pulled them closer to the source of the green light.
A crystalline X shape hovered amongst the wind, shining the same colour as the light that it replaced. The wind moved in, pulling the now blue and red shards towards it. They coalesced into a single form, the red found at each point of the X, the blue within the corners.
When the wind carried nothing, the light turned blinding. A figure flashed in it, and the cloud sea on the floor began disappearing. The figure in the light grew substance, a body forming in the display.
Where the shape was floating, a person now stood. A fair maiden in elegant dress, with flowing silver hair and fluffy ears that stood tall on her head. The shape itself was now embedded in her chest
She was quick to notice how she was dressed, and yelped in fear.
She shut her eyes tight and trembled as her body quickly flashed again.
Replacing the maiden was Nia, crossing her arms to warm her shuddering self.
"Not yet." She muttered, her comparatively short ears pressed flat, "Maybe someday, but not yet."
She peaked out with one eye, and then with both, looking around in confusion.
"What the hell?" She said, shock outweighing the brief panic she had just come from.
The holes and burn marks perplexed her. She hadn't been gone for all that long, what happened in the time she was dead?
Worry grew on her face as she looked around the room. Her eyes searched for something, growing increasingly frantic until she spotted something directly behind her.
A piece of a certain core crystal.
Normally it would be a motley mix of red, blue and purple.
Now it was empty, cold and dead.
There was a sheer flat edge, a sign of breakage. It was still twisted, but it was missing a large chunk. There were only four jagged points spreading out of it, a little like a hand without a thumb.
"Rex…" said Nia.
I guess I just always had some spark of hope in the back of my mind that just maybe, some day, I'd find something that belonged to the Architect. Something I could use to get up there.
The irony really was painful. He had found just such a thing, and it was the last thing he ever did.
If I die…well, I guess that's fine either way. At least I tried to make it up to him.
She hadn't known him all that long, really. Still, what little she knew about him spoke leagues of his character. He was reckless, bad with money, too optimistic for his own good, and most importantly he definitely didn't deserve this.
"I'm sorry this happened to you. Sorry I didn't try harder to talk you out of it…"
She wanted to say one last thing to him, that she would take his dream for him, and climb a tree. It really did feel silly, but she couldn't. Not yet, not until she could properly lay him to rest.
She tucked the core away into her bag and turned back to face the rest of the room, looking into one of the holes that were burned into the floor.
It was the only place she hadn't checked for what she was looking for, and the only place she couldn't check.
A few tears fell into the cloud sea, despite her best efforts to hold them in.
"Dromarch!" She shouted into the sea, as if he could hear her, "I'm sorry for not listening to you! I don't know if they took you, or what, but…" she didn't really know what to say. "I've got something to take care of first, I'll come back for you when we're wrapped up! "
She could feel a sudden tug in the ether, familiar in style, but different than what she was used to.
"If-no, when we meet again…I grant you full permission to say 'I told you so' as many times as you like."
The tug was beginning to pull much harder. She had run out of time to look around. She turned her eyes to the ceiling, like everything else in the room burn marks were scattered about the metal, some even sagging as if they were melted. Nia still wasn't sure what happened in here, but she wasn't about to complain about learning how to get out in a timely manner.
Her ears flared to the side in anger, but Nia focused herself. She fixed her mind on the pull, directing it into her hand. The pull flared with resonance in response, and a certain red stick-thing appeared in Nia's grasp.
As natural as could be, she flicked it, and the sword of the aegis flared to life. A roaring flame of a blade shot from its center, while some sections in the back fired like afterburners.
She looked over her shoulder, taking one last look at the room before she put her plan into action.
"Thank you for everything, Dromarch. I mean it, I will find you again."
Not five seconds later, the room was engulfed in an inferno.
The ship was impressively stable when free floating. The salvagers had disengaged the crane a while ago, but the strength of the floaters was surprising.
The group had just about prepared to send in their own teams following the leading drivers, just in time for said driver to return to the main deck.
Driver, singular. There was only one. The only ones returning were the two men funding the operation and the blade of the taller man.
That was already concerning enough, their only medic had gone with them.
She was a good medic too, and as sassy a gormotti as ever there was.
Not to mention Argentum's salvaging prodigy, Rex.
They made for an interesting pair. Gossip said that this was the first time anyone had ever seen the girl, she had only just shown up with Rex the other day. They were still just kids though, so everyone was already skeptical about them going in first.
The tall man's blade had caused a bit of a ruckus en transit when he drunkenly eavesdropped on a conversation and thought they were talking shit. He was basically passive the rest of the way once it was explained that they were talking about Ignas, but the seeds of suspicion were sown.
The fact that the two men somehow let themselves lose two kids in an ancient shipwreck made those seeds begin to sprout.
Whispers began around the workers, remarking on everything mentioned, as well as the giant black tube the larger man was carrying on his shoulder.
The foreman had mentioned the men had only one target in the whole of the ship, did they find it already?
Several salvagers were making disappointed comments about not being able to explore this beauty of a ship.
Few noticed that the black-clad man was whispering something to his blade.
The fish-faced, lizard-looking thing donned a wild thing-that-could-be-described-as-a-smile and drew his weapon.
There was a dark blurr, the blade broke full sprint towards the Maelstrom.
Too many people were watching to let him get away with it. Yells of surprise, shouts of warning.
The salvagers who were already armed were the first to meet him as the rest ran back to the Maelstrom, but the fight was over before anyone could turn back around to see how they were doing.
The men that attempted to fend off Sever were systematically knocked to the ground one after the next.
The blade never spoke. He simply laughed hysterically the whole time.
His tonfa practically sang as he swung it. Every attack whistled, seeming to signal its thirst for blood. The salvagers were beyond outmatched, and the driver made no sign he was going to stop his blade as he calmly walked towards the battle.
All hands of the ship watched in fear, the blade was toying with their best fighters, none of them were truly warriors. This wasn't a barfight, general salvagers weren't qualified for proper battles.
The sight of what saved them would be burned into their memory for the rest of their lives. Pun not intended.
With even less warning than the vicious blade's attacks, the very same was interrupted by his driver's cargo spontaneously combusting.
The man in question cursed in annoyance as he pushed the burning box off his shoulder. It didn't even get a chance to stop sliding before the fire devoured it.
The flame turned towering, illuminating the whole of the ship.
An ember the size of a cannon ball shot out of the blaze, and shortly after the flame died down.
The spark landed on the ship's far end, atop the door the two contractors just came from.
It burned for a spell, before lowering slightly, revealing a girl standing in the blaze. Her clothes were as red as the fire she stood in, and the deck in front of her seemed to take that as a challenge. A righteous battle cry of a meow began gradually growing louder as the floor turned molten.
When the deck collapsed, a storm of a wildfire spun through hole, the heroic cat noise now at its clearest. A second burning figure came from the hole, dissipating to reveal the missing medic.
She stood proud and defiant, and now wielded a fancy new blade weapon. A sword, blazing orange and green. She pointed it towards the two now hostile men, and began to speak.
"Now, I might just be old fashioned, but aren't you supposed to at least treat a lady to dinner before you go thrusting your sword into her?"
Nia could hear Jin make a slight tch noise, like he was more inconvenienced than threatened.
Malos on the other hand was fuming. It would be hard to tell with ordinary ears, but Nia could hear how hard he was breathing through his wild eyes and a raging grimace.
"You…and that sword…can't be!" The man in black shouted.
Honestly, Nia was having a hard time believing it herself, but here she was, and they'd have to be even crazier than she thought they were if they think she'll go down that easily again.
"Pyra!" She called with a look over her shoulder.
The red-haired blade was quick to call back, "I'm here!"
"Feel like fightin' or are you still sleepy?"
Pyra leaped down to be by her new driver's side, a slight smile on her lips, "I'd be glad to."
Malos seemed to take this as a personal challenge, Nia heard him tell Jin to let him handle it. She heard him shout to Sever, and his tonfa was back in hand.
Weapon ready, Nia charged into battle, more than happy to give her murderers a rematch.
Driver against driver, their weapons clashed.
Sever leaped over them, taunting Pyra to keep her occupied.
Nia found herself knocked back from her own strike, the red sword bouncing off a block from Malos. She could see him ready a counter, and swung once more before he could.
The aegis sword was heavier than Nia was expecting. It wasn't all that big when dormant, but it was nearly as tall as she was when active. Much bigger than the only other sword she had any training in. As she narrowly dodged a jab from Malos, she was quick to realize she couldn't get away with only using one hand.
She kept back to make some distance, readjusted her grip, and jumped back in with as heavy an overhead slash as she could manage.
Malos blocked it, but Nia did her best to keep the pressure on.
As the clash held, Malos began smirking.
"You really have no idea how to use that thing, do you?"
Nia grit her teeth a little as he began pushing back. Their height difference made leverage difficult.
"Never stopped me before!"
Technically that was true, but this was a much different situation than that time she learned she could reverse frostbite.
She broke off and tried making some distance again, but Malos gave chase.
"Where you running, kitty cat? Aren't you the one who started this fight?!"
"Nia!" she heard Pyra call, too preoccupied with Sever to help.
She couldn't do much but dodge as Malos kept up his offensive, her mind raced as she tried thinking of a strategy. She had come back to life for this, she couldn't die again just because she didn't know how to use a two-handed weapon!
In an instant, she remembered Rex. The piece of junk he called a sword was two handed. She had seen him in action a few times now, it couldn't be that hard to imitate him.
Remembering the first time she had ever seen him fight, she dodged a horizontal slash with a back handspring, using the momentum of it to kick Malos in the chin.
He took a step back to regain the little balance he lost, somewhat impressed Nia actually managed a hit. Rex's lead boots would have made a better impact, but she took the small victory.
The moment of breathing room was all Nia needed, she adopted the stance Rex always used, crouching to keep movement easy and making her even shorter.
He might have been taller than her, but that meant he had to aim lower to hit her, which meant he could have just as little leverage against a lower center of gravity.
Nia had always noticed something about how Rex attacked, but she never thought very hard about it. Holding a weapon like his, Nia began to understand. A heavier weapon obviously took more effort to swing, but Rex always attacked with what Nia used to think was more effort than necessary.
Now she knew, a weapon like this isn't swung to cut like she would with her twin rings. A sword this heavy is meant to chop.
She resumed the offense, putting her all into each swing. It was clearly having an effect, she was actually managing to push Malos back. She even landed a few hits.
They cauterized on contact, which should have made them even more painful, but Malos just kept grinning.
"Well, well, look at this! I suppose I'll eat my words, you're a fast learner!" His smile grew more evil as they held one last clash, "Of course, you realize this means that I can't let you have her power!"
"Yeah, why's that?"
"Like I'd tell you!"
The man practically snarled that last bit as he broke off, backpedaling a surprising distance with a single hop. In a moment, Sever was above him, leapt away from his fight with Pyra. Another moment later and the tonfa was in the blade's hand, primed for a massive attack.
The lizard laughed as he sent a cross slash ripping through the air, not even giving his target the courtesy to identify what he calls the attack.
A quick flash of red appeared before Nia.
Sever had jumped away from Pyra, which meant she was free to protect Nia. A shining shield made of transparent hexagons was projected from the red head's hands, effortlessly absorbing the shock of Sever's projectile.
Dromarch had done the same a hundred times, but Pyra's felt so much stronger. He would have struggled, stepped back for a better stance, but Pyra stood with her hands stretched in front of her. Her block was effortless, and the attack disappeared on contact with the shield.
A quick flick of her ears picked up something, a radio coming from Jin.
"I'm maybe two minutes still, how's it going?" Came a compressed Mikhail's voice.
"She's awake and you're late. Bad combination, overall."
"…I was worried that's what I felt," The pause in the response was clearly more than just signal latency, " Sorry for the delay, but there were some security issues."
"Security?"
"Yeah, system started going crazy about an intruder in the cargo. It's definitely just a bug, but it took some time to sort it out. And before you say anything, I sent Cresidus to investigate on the astronomical chance it was a real alert."
"…Just get here as fast as you can."
Obviously, this was a bad thing. Whatever they were talking about, it involved Mikhail and, more threateningly, that behemoth of a blade Cresidus joining the fight. Nia wasn't sure she could handle two drivers, especially not with a weapon she was so inexperienced in, and if she couldn't…
Well, she wasn't about to let a ship full of bystanders watch her only other option.
"Everyone! Get out of here!" She shouted, for their sake as much as her's.
It was directed at the Maelstrom, who was already maybe thirty seconds from gathering the injured and setting off. For some reason, they weren't already going as fast as they could with that regard.
The sudden increase in motion seemed to catch Malos' eye, causing him to call back Sever's weapon. It's edge went from tangled to straight as it faced outward, becoming more sword like as once again showing his impressive jumping skills as he leaped the distance to the far end of the boat.
He takes aim at the gangplanks holding the last of the escaping salvagers, but he made the more impressive mistake of losing focus on the girl with the aegis.
Nia still wasn't sure what made Pyra so special that a blade needed a fancy name, but she knew the red-head was strong. A blast of flames from the sword acted as a rocket, and within moments they were within striking range. Nia figured it was only fair they try hitting Malos with a special attack after Sever tried hitting them.
She let Pyra take the lead and held the handle, feeling the fuel of ether pour into it from all involved.
She wasn't sure how she suddenly knew the name of this attack, but something deep inside her told her to shout it with all her might.
" Burning…"
They raised the sword to the sky, it's blade glowing brighter and hotter,
" SWORD!"
A single swing at Malos, and the whole prow was engulfed in flames. Nia had seem Ardainian weapons the size of houses with half this kind of fire power.
Pun not intended.
This made it all the more frightening when Malos seemed more annoyed than hurt.
He scowled as he held a block, "You damn brat. How can a nobody like you wield her power like this?"
He said nothing more from a moment as his eyes quickly darted between the girls, clearly processing something.
"…well that's interesting…"
Nia was now even more concerned, "what's that mean?"
"Like I'd tell you!" He said for the second time this fight.
Malos made a surprising move of trying to grab Nia. Pyra was fast enough to leap away from the clash and far out of reach, but for a moment Nia swore she saw black smoke leaking from Malos' hand.
As they landed a way's back, right where the gangplanks used to be, Malos pointed to Pyra.
"You're pretty sharp for someone who's only just woken up!" He complimented with half sarcasm, "almost takes me back. How long has it been? Four, five hundred years?"
He chuckled a little to himself as he stroked his chin, like he was actually reminiscing in the middle of a battle.
"But there's one problem. The hell's with that outfit? More pressingly, why only wake up now?"
Malos and Pyra had a history it seems, apparently one older than Nia could realistically comprehend. On one hand, there was no real reason to trust what Malos was saying. On the other, Malos had no reason to lie anymore, and Pyra wasn't disputing it. She wasn't saying much of anything, just staring angrily.
Malos continued, "I'm guessing your goal is Elysium."
Pyra finally spoke up, "That… is our dream, and none of your business!"
"Anything involving you automatically becomes my business, and anything involving you and Elysium I can't allow!"
There was clearly more happening here than Nia could understand, she was just thankful it was giving the Maelstrom time to escape.
The clash and debate had been more than long enough for the ship to put some distance on their position.
They were well out of range for any kind of ether attacks, and for a moment Nia was thankful.
Then, she was staggered.
The ancient boat suddenly rocked as the waves of the cloud sea began to buck.
The waves didn't stick around for long, but what caused them was further cause for concern.
The giant Titan-less boat from Argentum, the black one that had chased Nia ever since she was put on Indol's wanted list. It was here. It was theirs. Worst of all, it was armed.
Cannons and launchers of varying sizes and calibers began folding out of it, and Mikhail's voice once again was audible.
"Sorry for the wait, gentlemen, but the cavalry has arrived." He jokingly proclaimed, "now then, who dies first?"
Jin was fast to direct his friend, "The Maelstrom. Sink it."
"Say less."
The new boat's cannons primed, swiveling to point directly at the fleeing Maelstrom. These twisted bastards were preparing to shoot down a retreating vessel.
Nia could practically feel the dread Pyra felt through their ether string. Nia couldn't blame her, she was horrified as well.
Over the hiss of machinery, Nia could just barely hear Jin's radio buzz with Mikhail's voice once again.
"Locked on target, firing now!"
Nia couldn't turn away as she watched.
A thunderous blast as the cannon fired.
A salvo of massive, gold-coloured spears hurdled through the air.
Missing the Maelstrom completely.
They harmlessly sailed over the ship's Titan, a distant thoomp signaling they all hit nothing but cloud sea.
It was easy to tell why the aim was off, the black ship was all of a sudden half-way to capsizing.
Nia watched in awe as the large black ship lurched heavily, causing a huge volume of cloud sea to splash on board the battle ground.
Another splash went off as the black ship rocked back, and Nia heard Malos shout something like "Mik, what the hell was that?"
The resulting static and garbled words of an intruder, heavy damages, and something about the cargo hold made Nia sigh with relief for a moment, only to have her dread replenished as one more word managed to make it through the scratched mess of broken radio noises.
"-surfacing!"
A plume of mist erupted from the cloud sea's surface, a large silhouette was visible inside through the moonlight.
It landed on the black ship, several heavy impacts could be heard a moment later.
As metal plating began falling overboard, the ship's weapons swerved to point at it.
'It' proceeded to rip them out.
A single cannon managed to fire, knocking whatever it was off one ship, and on to another.
This whatever-it-was crashed into the deck in front of Nia, herself barely dodging a massive cable caught on it, and even at this distance, she couldn't tell what it was. It was long, nearly half the length of the enormous deck it now laid on.
Its shape was completely alien to Nia. She looked to Pyra, and found a face that looked as confused as she was.
The beast rose to full height, standing on its hind legs.
Almost immediately after, it collapsed back down as those same hind legs buckled under the weight.
It caught itself on its forelimbs, its head stopping just short of colliding with the deck. That head shook itself, a remarkably human gesture for something that so clearly wasn't. The shake then travelled down its long neck and into its body, not dissimilar to how she'd seen Dromarch shake water off himself. The residual cloud sea flew off its body, the shaking stopped just before it reached the tail.
With all the fog off of it, Nia got her first proper look at the beast, and continued to not recognize it. It was unlike any animal she had ever seen or heard of. That did still leave open the possibility that it was a Titan. A possibility that was getting more likely the longer she took in the sight of it.
In a word, it was huge. That word alone didn't do it justice, not by a long shot, but it was a word. It wasn't as big as certain denizens of Gormott, and if it was a Titan it would be an honourable mention on the list of smallest Titans Nia had ever seen, but that only meant it was relatively small, it was still larger than most other things.
It appeared to be a quadruped, though by necessity rather than design. Its hind legs should have been able to support most of its full upper body, but there were complications that literally led to its downfall. As sleek and lithe as most of this creature seemed to be, there were two glaring exceptions.
Technically it was three exceptions, but the collosal front limbs could probably be counted together. If Nia curled up into a ball, its shoulders would still be larger than her, and the forearm was even more out of proportion. Even thicker around than the upper, they were bigger than Dromarch and armoured to the point of limiting finger movement. More on that note, it had fingers. Otherwise fully dexterous, somewhat uncomfortably human-like fingers. Human-like only if one overlooked the carving knives it had for claws. A balled fist was bigger than the creature's own head. One such fist was being used to support itself after its stumble.
The other aspect of it that stood out against the rest of the monster's body was its tail, for lack of a better term.
Nia hesitated to call it a tail because of its size. She had mistaken it for a cable from the black ship's demolition appointment, the beast's overall length was nearly tripled by the massive appendage extending from its rear, and it was wider around than several tree species could ever dream of becoming. The rear legs seemed to struggle just as much with carrying that as it did the top half. Even if the beast's chest was on the floor, its hind legs could only lift a meter of the tail off the ground. This fact became evident as the animal seemed to be struggling to figure out exactly how it was meant to stand.
Some wings wouldn't be amiss among the mess of biology Nia was looking at, but there were none. Instead, a large dorsal fin stood in the center of its back. Beginning at the shoulders, it ran until the edge of the tail. The fin itself was thicker than those of most fish, looking more like an ax head than the sail it should resemble.
Malos seemed just as dumbfounded, and if Jin had any kind of reaction Nia couldn't tell.
Sever on the other hand proved to be quite the opportunist.
He attempted to charge aegis and driver while all were too distracted by the new visitor, but said visitor did not take kindly to this.
A single bat of an arm took the blade by surprise, the beast's reach surprising due the sheer size of the limb, and Sever was knocked into a railing. He would have fallen overboard if his tail didn't catch the fence.
Seeming unsatisfied that Sever was still moving, the creature made a charging crawl. Its footsteps were like gunshots, every move it made forward threatened to punch a hole in the deck. Its tiny hind legs contributed precious little to its mobility, the arms were doing all the heavy lifting. Quite literally, the only other parts touching the ground through the charge was most of its own tail.
Sever barely put a shield up before the Titan tried grabbing him. The hand would have been able to cover over half of the lizard-like blade, could have ended this fight as easily as crushing a beer can. Instead, it was like watching someone try to grab a beach ball. The beast's fingers found no grip on the ether shield, though he didn't stop it from trying to squeeze it. His metaphorical toy shot back away from the now closed fist, with the surprise inside laughing with mockery.
With a frustrated noise, the Titan lunged at Sever once again, and was met with almost the same response. Sever's shield was raised in an instant.
Apparently, this was according to plan. In a startling display of intelligence, the Titan quickly extended both hands. Purchase was found, and the black-scaled blade was caught shield-first in the titan's vice-grip. The Titan swings it's massive tail around, coiling it in front and using it as a kind of counterbalance/cushion so that it could stand to some degree, allowing it to lift the Sever ball into the air.
Sever stared in disbelief for a moment, suspended in his only defense as he did his best to keep it active. He was so focused on what's happening, he didn't realize the Titan's head was reeling back.
That is, until it was too late.
The Titan's head hit the shield at full force, Sever grimaced with the effort of keeping it up. The grimace was made worse as Titan's face hit the shield again.
Two more attacks landed on the blade's guard, before the Titan suddenly changed tactics and began beating the floor with it.
Cracks were appearing around Sever's shield as the blade howled with the strain of it.
The Titan wasn't finished either, it began alternating the impacts between face and floor, floor and face.
It'd ram its face into the shield, and follow with smashing it into the ground. The time it took to bring it down was just enough to wind up another hit with its face.
Nia watched with a bit of morbid fascination as the increasingly terrified Sever was thrown up and down, into a face and into the floor.
Face, then floor.
Face.
Floor.
Slam.
Slam.
Slam…
Slap- CRUNCH
The beast roared in pain as its attempt at a finishing blow failed. It had tried to hit Sever with both the floor and its head at once, but it was too heavily telegraphed. At the last moment, Sever dropped his shield and backpedaled. The Titans hands clapped together as they were no longer holding anything, and were both crushed between the floor and their owner's head.
"Not the brightest, is it?" Malos mocked the animal's misfortune, "a bit freaky looking too."
Sever had returned to his master's side, and the pair seemed to be preparing yet another big attack.
It couldn't go on like this. Malos was none the worse for wear even after all the fighting thus far. Jin hadn't even lifted a finger yet, and they just received reinforcements. Nia's ace in the hole probably wouldn't amount to much, not after being so long out of practice. The freak appearance of this Titan wasn't even enough to land more than one hit against their blade, and now it was down for the count!
Although…Nia was definitely not out of practice with regular healing. The beast was clearly powerful to rip holes through that new boat, if only slightly dim witted. Broken hands are a plain old injury, so if Pyra could buy some time on her own, then Nia could…
Nia could…
Nia could feel something breathing down her neck.
She could see both Malos' and Sever's eyes widen, with Jin taking a slightly more defensive stance than usual.
Slowly, Nia raised her head, and looked directly above her.
The Titan was above her.
The Titan was upside down, hanging from its tail stamped firm on the ground like the stand of a figurine to avoid putting pressure on its forelimbs.
And it was above her.
It was uncomfortably close, Nia could have made out every detail of its draconian face, but she was specifically drawn to its eyes for some reason.
The Titan stared at her and she stared back. The eyes looked young and intelligent, and more than that, there was a vague sense of familiarity in the eyes.
Nia didn't know why to start, but she came to a shocking and completely illogical realization when she made notice of the eye color.
They were a rusted orange-brown. The same color as…
"It…can't be…"
She heard footsteps, and the Titan looked up from their staring contest. Malos had resumed his approach, and was approaching fast.
The Titan reared, its head swung back away from the attacking driver, before swinging back like a pendulum to face the aggressor.
Through the whole motion, Nia heard it inhale.
No, inhale was too minor a word. It was gulping in air like its life depended on it. It probably did, so that was presumably a good thing?
There was a pause as it seemed to run out of space in it to fit the air, and it donned quite the glare as it stared down the charging Malos.
The dorsal fin on it began to move. Slightly at first, it raised and lowered, eventually growing faster and the motions wider, like a bellows pumping into a fire, before pressing itself flat against the back of the Titan.
Nia didn't know how she knew what was about to happen, but her sense of hearing would forever be grateful.
She covered her ears, dropped to the ground. A split second later, the loudest noise she had ever heard came from directly above her. So loud, she could only hear a fraction of a second. Almost instantly, she couldn't hear anything but ringing. Her hands suddenly felt damp for some reason, but she didn't dare take them off her ears. The noise shook to her core, she could feel it shake her entire body and reverberate through her skull.
It was too much.
She began feeling dizzy, grey splotches began dancing across her vision, the air in her lungs was being forced to move.
The last thing she remembered was the ground becoming sideways as watched the Titan tumble off the deck.
Author Note: I didn't really want to go through all the trouble of describing what the Titan looks like, so here's a picture.
A link to a Reddit post because I couldn't get the img tag to work properly
r/Xenoblade_Chronicles/comments/vuwkbv/oc_titan_design_for_my_xc2_fic/?utm_source=share&utm_medium=ios_app&utm_name=iossmf